Does anyone here mill their own flour/other grain at home?

[Padraig]

Bread baking has been a passionate hobby of mine for almost a decade, but within the last couple years I've become concerned that flour is just not flour anymore, even brands that claim to be 100% stone ground. To avoid the problems with commercial whole wheat, I've been interested in grinding my own flour for homemade sourdough bread, but there are two main problems I've run into: 1) wheat berries are twice as expensive as even the best flours (average is about $2/lb); and 2) countertop mills are really expensive, even hand-cranked ones (about $200 for one that actually works). Since you aren't saving money by buying the wheat berries instead of flour, you never recoup the cost of the grinder.

So I was wondering if anyone here has any experience in this area. It seemed like the sort of thing that might appeal to this crowd If so, where did you get your grinder, and where do you buy your wheat berries? How much would you estimate you spend in a year on wheat?

[Maximilian]

The Haydens used to do this. I wonder if it's possible to contact any of them? Although only the older ones would remember.

[Heinrich]

Thank you for giving me an idea of something Mrs. Heinrich and I can do together. I was thinking of enrolling in a pottery class as a surprise, but now I might get a mill and grain to grind and bake.

I would not let the (erroneous) pecuniary pursuit of a hobby be a hindrance to actually doing it. I have dogs and cold blooded critters, a garage gym, and guns. They all cost money and net me zero lettuce, but honest enjoyment. If you wanna a bake a da bread, buy da stuff.

[Traditionallyruralmom]

I have a wonder mill, and I love it.  It was worth every penny.  It grinds beautiful, fine flour. It even grinds corn!  Fresh cornmeal is such a luxury!  No bitter taste.  The best meatless Friday corn pone you will ever taste is with fresh ground cornmeal!!  And the same for wheat flour, store bought wheat flour gets bitter so quickly.  I hated anything wheat forever because I associated a bitter taste with it.  Not anymore since I grind my own flour.  I had a kitchen aid grinder attachment, and it made a very course flour, not at all nice. Good for cracked hot cereal mixes.  But it was all I had for years, and I made the best of it. This fall, I bought some local grown Einkorn wheat, and I will get spelt as well.  Again, for so many reasons, it is worth the $2 a pound.  I believe in spending money on good quality, wholesome, whole foods.  We are going on 9 children, and I won't skimp on quality, whole ingredients, even though we are not well off.
I will order my spelt by the 50# bag from our local Co-op or get Great River Mills from Amazon.  I use food safe buckets from Menards and gamma lids to store it.  Hard to say how much I spend...

[Lynne]

I have a wonder mill, and I love it.  It was worth every penny.  It grinds beautiful, fine flour. It even grinds corn!  Fresh cornmeal is such a luxury!  No bitter taste.  The best meatless Friday corn pone you will ever taste is with fresh ground cornmeal!!  And the same for wheat flour, store bought wheat flour gets bitter so quickly.  I hated anything wheat forever because I associated a bitter taste with it.  Not anymore since I grind my own flour.  I had a kitchen aid grinder attachment, and it made a very course flour, not at all nice. Good for cracked hot cereal mixes.  But it was all I had for years, and I made the best of it. This fall, I bought some local grown Einkorn wheat, and I will get spelt as well.  Again, for so many reasons, it is worth the $2 a pound.  I believe in spending money on good quality, wholesome, whole foods.  We are going on 9 children, and I won't skimp on quality, whole ingredients, even though we are not well off.
I will order my spelt by the 50# bag from our local Co-op or get Great River Mills from Amazon.  I use food safe buckets from Menards and gamma lids to store it.  Hard to say how much I spend...

Local Einkorn?! The only place I knew to get it was from https://jovialfoods.com/.

[Traditionallyruralmom]

I have a wonder mill, and I love it.  It was worth every penny.  It grinds beautiful, fine flour. It even grinds corn!  Fresh cornmeal is such a luxury!  No bitter taste.  The best meatless Friday corn pone you will ever taste is with fresh ground cornmeal!!  And the same for wheat flour, store bought wheat flour gets bitter so quickly.  I hated anything wheat forever because I associated a bitter taste with it.  Not anymore since I grind my own flour.  I had a kitchen aid grinder attachment, and it made a very course flour, not at all nice. Good for cracked hot cereal mixes.  But it was all I had for years, and I made the best of it. This fall, I bought some local grown Einkorn wheat, and I will get spelt as well.  Again, for so many reasons, it is worth the $2 a pound.  I believe in spending money on good quality, wholesome, whole foods.  We are going on 9 children, and I won't skimp on quality, whole ingredients, even though we are not well off.
I will order my spelt by the 50# bag from our local Co-op or get Great River Mills from Amazon.  I use food safe buckets from Menards and gamma lids to store it.  Hard to say how much I spend...

Local Einkorn?! The only place I knew to get it was from https://jovialfoods.com/.

I got the 2 of the 50% bag of berries.  I was hoping to use them to sprout and then grind into flour, but many of the grans are broken, probably 30%, so it is unsproutable.  Iwas a bit disappointed, but the flavor is excellent, so it all worked out.  I store them in one of my freezers to keep fresh. I bought some spelt from Great River to sprout and then grind.
 https://meuerfarm.com/index.html

[Padraig]

I have a wonder mill, and I love it.  It was worth every penny.  It grinds beautiful, fine flour. It even grinds corn!  Fresh cornmeal is such a luxury!  No bitter taste.  The best meatless Friday corn pone you will ever taste is with fresh ground cornmeal!!  And the same for wheat flour, store bought wheat flour gets bitter so quickly.  I hated anything wheat forever because I associated a bitter taste with it.  Not anymore since I grind my own flour.  I had a kitchen aid grinder attachment, and it made a very course flour, not at all nice. Good for cracked hot cereal mixes.  But it was all I had for years, and I made the best of it. This fall, I bought some local grown Einkorn wheat, and I will get spelt as well.  Again, for so many reasons, it is worth the $2 a pound.  I believe in spending money on good quality, wholesome, whole foods.  We are going on 9 children, and I won't skimp on quality, whole ingredients, even though we are not well off.
I will order my spelt by the 50# bag from our local Co-op or get Great River Mills from Amazon.  I use food safe buckets from Menards and gamma lids to store it.  Hard to say how much I spend...

I'll keep looking into the WonderMill. I saw the hand cranked one (popular with preppers) which was able to handle not just wheat, but also make peanut butter, crack barley for making beer, and grinding flax seeds. I've watched people using it on YouTube videos, though, and it's really slow. Unfortunately the electric one can't handle all of these things. I'm glad to know someone is successfully using it, and really loves it, though! I'll do some more thinking about whether it'll be worth it right now.

[Padraig]

Thank you for giving me an idea of something Mrs. Heinrich and I can do together. I was thinking of enrolling in a pottery class as a surprise, but now I might get a mill and grain to grind and bake.

I would not let the (erroneous) pecuniary pursuit of a hobby be a hindrance to actually doing it. I have dogs and cold blooded critters, a garage gym, and guns. They all cost money and net me zero lettuce, but honest enjoyment. If you wanna a bake a da bread, buy da stuff.

If I had more disposable income, I would definitely invest more into this hobby. I'll just have to justify it to myself as more of a lifelong investment than a simple hobby expense...

[Traditionallyruralmom]

I have a wonder mill, and I love it.  It was worth every penny.  It grinds beautiful, fine flour. It even grinds corn!  Fresh cornmeal is such a luxury!  No bitter taste.  The best meatless Friday corn pone you will ever taste is with fresh ground cornmeal!!  And the same for wheat flour, store bought wheat flour gets bitter so quickly.  I hated anything wheat forever because I associated a bitter taste with it.  Not anymore since I grind my own flour.  I had a kitchen aid grinder attachment, and it made a very course flour, not at all nice. Good for cracked hot cereal mixes.  But it was all I had for years, and I made the best of it. This fall, I bought some local grown Einkorn wheat, and I will get spelt as well.  Again, for so many reasons, it is worth the $2 a pound.  I believe in spending money on good quality, wholesome, whole foods.  We are going on 9 children, and I won't skimp on quality, whole ingredients, even though we are not well off.
I will order my spelt by the 50# bag from our local Co-op or get Great River Mills from Amazon.  I use food safe buckets from Menards and gamma lids to store it.  Hard to say how much I spend...

I'll keep looking into the WonderMill. I saw the hand cranked one (popular with preppers) which was able to handle not just wheat, but also make peanut butter, crack barley for making beer, and grinding flax seeds. I've watched people using it on YouTube videos, though, and it's really slow. Unfortunately the electric one can't handle all of these things. I'm glad to know someone is successfully using it, and really loves it, though! I'll do some more thinking about whether it'll be worth it right now.

I am no prepper at this point in my life, more of a survive the day-er... but I do have lots of bulk food and freezers full of meat.  About 20 years ago, we had the prepper mindset, and I had dreams of this one
https://www.lehmans.com/product/diamant-grain-mill
but I am more practical now, and realize if the crap is gonna hit the fan, I'm going to be pretty schnuckered, and depending on the wisdom of my Amish neighbors

[Maximilian]

I'll just have to justify it to myself as more of a lifelong investment than a simple hobby expense...

The intellect serves its purpose by inventing plausible justifications for the things desired by the heart.

[Maximilian]

[Maximilian]

[Maximilian]

[Maximilian]

[Chestertonian]

that's interesting..
we just found out my 2.5 year old son has a wheat and nut allergy but what's interesting is that he can have barley and spelt so my mom has used those.  My wife and kids don't eat much in the way of carbs but it sounds like a good option for ensuring that it doesn't come into contact with wheat